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Learning from sustainabledevelopment: education in the light ofpublic issuesKatrien Van Poeck a & Joke Vandenabeele aa Catholic University of Leuven, Leuven, Belgium

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Learning from sustainable development: education in the light ofpublic issues

Katrien Van Poeck* and Joke Vandenabeele

Catholic University of Leuven, Leuven, Belgium

(Received 1 February 2011; final version received 10 October 2011)

Education for sustainable development plays an increasing role in environmentaleducation policy and practice. In this article, we show how sustainable develop-ment is mainly seen as a goal that can be achieved by applying the proper pro-cesses of learning and how this learning perspective translates sustainabilityissues into learning problems of individuals. We present a different perspectiveon education for sustainable development and emphasize the importance of pre-senting issues of sustainable development as ‘public issues’, i.e. as matters ofpublic concern. This shifts the focus from the competences that citizens mustacquire to the democratic nature of the spaces and practices in which participa-tion and citizenship can develop.

Keywords: ESD; democracy; participation; citizenship; socialization; subjectifi-cation

Introduction

Since the publication of the Brundtland Report (WCED 1987), sustainable develop-ment has played an increasing role in environmental education policy and practice.Education for sustainable development (ESD)1 is primarily policy-driven, highlyinfluenced by decisions made in international institutions (Jickling and Wals 2007;Nomura and Abe 2009). Nevertheless, opinions concerning the desirability of ESDas a new focal point for environmental education are sharply divided (e.g. Jickling1994; Sauvé 1996, 1999; González-Gaudiano 1999; Gough and Scott 1999; Huckle1999; Smyth 1999; Foster 2001; Scott 2002; Sauvé and Berryman 2005; Selby2006; Chapman 2007; Jickling and Wals 2007; Gadotti 2008; Sumner 2008; Bajajand Chiu 2009; Mogensen and Schnack 2010). Critics have raised the concern thateducation for sustainable development – like education for anything else – reduceseducation to a mere instrument for promoting a specific kind of ‘sustainable’ behav-iour (Jickling 1994). At the core of this debate is the problematic relationshipbetween democracy and sustainable development (Læssøe 2007). In February 2010,this journal devoted a special issue to the meaning of democracy and values in rela-tion to environmental and sustainability education. Sustainability issues are situatedin a field of tension between the personal and the political, as almost every ‘private’decision has ‘public’ consequences and social conditions affect individuals’ freedomof choice. They have far-reaching implications and require a democratic approach

*Corresponding author. Email: katrien.vanpoeck@ppw.kuleuven.be

Environmental Education Research2011, 1–12, iFirst Article

ISSN 1350-4622 print/ISSN 1469-5871 online� 2011 Taylor & Francishttp://dx.doi.org/10.1080/13504622.2011.633162http://www.tandfonline.com

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based on participation. Yet it is by no means obvious that citizen participation willenhance sustainability and serve ‘the common good’. Læssøe (2007) emphasizesthat there are no simple and obvious ways in which this tension may be resolved.Wals (2010) highlights this as a paradox between the sense of urgency emergingfrom a deep concern about the state of the planet and the conviction that it is wrongto persuade people to adopt pre- and expert-determined ways of thinking and act-ing. In this article, we address the issue of democracy in ESD, focusing on howeducational practices can deal with this unsolvable tension.

As part of a PhD study on the challenge posed to environmental education prac-tices by growing policy attention for ESD, we conducted an exploratory study ofthe literature in order to grasp the academic debate between advocates and oppo-nents of ESD. We analysed 64 references, for the most part articles published indisciplinary journals2 but also papers from journals with an interdisciplinary or edu-cational sciences focus, conference papers and books. References were selected inthose disciplinary journals as well as by consulting the web of science, using keywords such as ‘ESD’, ‘education for sustainable development’, ‘sustainable devel-opment’ or ‘sustainability’ combined with ‘education’ or ‘learning’, ‘DESD’ and‘Decade of education for sustainable development’. Furthermore, the reference listsof selected sources yielded additional references. This analysis did not only clarifythe diverse points of view on the relationship between environmental education andESD, but it also drew our attention to the argument advanced by many authors thateducation in the context of sustainable development is closely linked to citizenshipand requires both an individual and a collective focus (Huckle 1993, 1999; Jensenand Schnack 1997; Orr 2002; Jickling and Wals 2007; Gadotti 2008; Breiting 2009;Räthzel and Uzzell 2009; Mogensen and Schnack 2010). The latter is particularly rele-vant in the context of this PhD research, which is part of ongoing research at the Labo-ratory for Education and Society, KU Leuven. The aim of the Laboratory is toarticulate new and highly diverse societal challenges through the development oftheory (by forming concepts and language). Research at the Laboratory starts from theobservation that fundamental transformations are taking place in society as well as ineducational sciences and its disciplines. As a consequence, educational theory andpractice face important challenges. The educator is confronted with developments andpractices in which the question on how to live, both individually and socially, is posedanew. The Laboratory discusses problems and questions related to education, not asprivate and individual matters, but always as public concerns.

From this perspective, we want to contribute to the debate on the democratic par-adox in ESD. As we will explain below, we did not find the necessary concepts andarguments in the ESD and environmental education literature. Therefore, weexplored the literature about democracy, citizenship and civic learning. This analysisis theoretically anchored in the distinction made by Lawy and Biesta (2006) betweena ‘citizenship-as-achievement’ and ‘citizenship-as-practice’ approach. We first showhow the dominant discourse on ESD translates issues of sustainable developmentinto the traditional concept of ‘citizenship-as-achievement’, defining these issues aslearning problems faced by individuals and reinforcing an instrumental relationshipbetween learning, citizenship and democracy. In the second part of this article, weanalyse how Biesta but also Todd and Säfström criticize this ‘citizenship-as-achieve-ment’ perspective. Drawing on Jacques Rancière’s and Chantal Mouffe’s democracytheories, they present vital insights for a radically different perspective that is basedon a process of subjectification rather than socialization. Third, we show how these

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insights can offer a new perspective for ESD. We argue that presenting sustainabledevelopment issues as ‘public issues’, as matters of public concern, allows educa-tional practices to move beyond socialization and to experiment with the tensionbetween a sense of urgency and the need for democratic participation.

Citizenship-as-achievement

There is a tendency in contemporary society to frame processes of social change asa challenge for individuals to acquire the proper knowledge, behaviour and compe-tences (Biesta 2004; Simons and Masschelein 2010). Education experts aredeployed and the learning of individuals as well as groups and communitiesemerges as a solution for numerous problems (Wildemeersch and Vandenabeele2007). This applies to sustainable development in particular. UNESCO’s (2005)International Implementation Scheme for the Decade of ESD (DESD) states that thegeneral target of ESD is to foster the values and principles of sustainable develop-ment and to promote corresponding behavioural changes.

The overall goal of the DESD is to integrate the principles, values, and practices ofsustainable development into all aspects of education and learning. This educationaleffort will encourage changes in behaviour that will create a more sustainable futurein terms of environmental integrity, economic viability, and a just society for presentand future generations. (UNESCO 2005, 6)

A similar interpretation is reflected in the UNECE Strategy for ESD, which definesESD as a ‘prerequisite for achieving sustainable development’ (UNECE 2005, 1).In the international policy discourse on ESD, issues of sustainable development arethus mainly seen as matters of individual learning, as problems that can be tackledby applying the proper learning strategies.

The view that ESD is an effective tool in changing individual behaviour (Padenand Chhokar 2007) is equally prevalent in the academic literature, which suggeststhat educators should develop ‘strategies to help [. . .] people to choose more sustain-able options’ (Monroe 2007, 108). Nevertheless, others argue that the purpose of edu-cation is not to contribute to solving specific sustainability problems here and now bypromoting particular behavioural outcomes but that it should aim at the ‘empower-ment’ of active, critical and independent citizens who are able to decide for them-selves and to participate in democratic decision-making (Jensen and Schnack 1997;Huckle 1999, 2008; Jickling and Wals 2007; Breiting 2009; Mogensen and Schnack2010). Breiting (2009, 200) distinguishes between these two approaches as follows:

We still see major research contributions in the environmental education research fieldbuilding on the idea that environmental education is about ‘manipulating’ learners andgrownups into becoming individuals exhibiting ‘correct attitudes and behaviours’related to the environment following a ‘treatment’ or an ‘intervention’ with the neces-sary tools by the teacher or through an environmental education programme. Whilethe terms used here are deliberately stark, the key issue they articulate is the discrep-ancy between the idea that environmental education should foster active, critical andindependent citizens and other views that position learners as marionettes for the goodintentions of environmentalists or environmental educators.

However, within this scope of active citizenship, the emphasis is also onqualification and on fostering particular outcomes. Here, this is articulated in the

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expectation that education can qualify people for the role of active participant andprovide them with the proper learning experience to democratically achieve sustain-ability. This is particularly – though not exclusively – the case in the ‘action com-petence approach’ to environmental education and ESD (Jensen and Schnack 1997;Breiting 2009; Mogensen and Schnack 2010).

[. . .] one key role for ESD in an action competence approach becomes that of devel-oping the students’ ability, motivation and desire to play an active role in finding dem-ocratic solutions to problems and issues connected to sustainable development. Thechallenge for ESD in this perspective is to identify what kind of learning can qualifythe learners’ sound choices in a reality that is often characterised by complexity anduncertainty, and which also motivates them to be active citizens who are able to setthe agenda for changes if necessary. In this sense, sustainable development is more amatter of democratic citizenship than compliance and individual behaviour – and ESDis in a never-ending process of learning about how to qualify the participants to copewith this citizenship role in a sensible way. (Mogensen and Schnack 2010, 68–9)

However, translating education into a process of qualification and of teaching peoplehow to behave as active participants in a democratic society is not unproblematic.This learning perspective is closely linked to what Lawy and Biesta (2006) havecalled ‘citizenship-as-achievement’, i.e. the idea that citizenship is a status that indi-viduals can only achieve by moving through a particular learning trajectory. Citizen-ship is thus pinned down to a particular set of knowledge, attitudes and skills and alack of these can serve as a ground for excluding people from involvement. At thecore of this view is what Biesta (2011a) calls a ‘socialization conception’ of civiclearning. Everyone has to be socialized into the same standard and this standard isultimately based on a cluster of knowledge claims: ‘knowledge about what a goodcitizen is; knowledge about what a good citizen needs to learn; and knowledge abouthow individuals can learn to become good citizens’ (Biesta 2011a, 142). The mean-ing of citizenship as an essentially contested concept is ignored, and the space formarginalized voices and for alternative arguments and points of view is limited.

In the next section of the paper, we explore the views put forward by Biesta, Toddand Säfström, who developed a concept of education and citizenship that turns thisdominant socialization perspective upside down. Whereas the argument proposed bythe socialization approach to civic learning is that we need proper learning as individ-ual citizens in order to develop a better democracy, Biesta suggests ‘that we needmore and better democracy in order to get better citizens’ (Biesta 2011b, 8) Withinsuch a ‘citizenship-as-practice’ perspective (Lawy and Biesta 2006), the focus is nolonger on the competences that citizens must achieve, but on the democratic nature ofthe spaces and practices in which citizenship can develop.

Citizenship-as-practice

In a special issue of ‘Studies in Philosophy and Education’ on ‘Education, Conflictand the Political’ (Ruitenberg 2011), Biesta, Todd and Säfström draw on the democ-racy theories developed by Jacques Rancière and Chantal Mouffe as they try tomove beyond a socialization perspective on citizenship education. Vital to thisattempt is (1) Rancière’s radical interpretation of equality, (2) both authors’ under-standing of democracy as a disruption of the existing order and (3) their emphasison the importance of dissensus. Within the context of this article, we draw on thesethree crucial theoretical aspects but do not discuss these theories extensively.

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Rancière’s egalitarian view is reflected in his definition of democracy as ‘thepower of those who have no specific qualification for ruling, except the fact of hav-ing no qualification’ (Rancière 2004, 305 in Simons and Masschelein 2010, 593).Mouffe and Rancière both emphasize the limitations of an ‘ordered’ understandingof democratic politics (Biesta 2011a). For Rancière (1995, 1999), democratic poli-tics should be understood as a process of ‘subjectification’ through which new waysof doing and being come into existence. Subjectification differs from identification,which is a process of taking up an identity within the existing order. Subjectifica-tion, on the other hand, always involves ‘disidentification’, embracing a way ofbeing that had no place in the existing order of things. Subjectification is thereforea supplement to this order (Rancière 2003), because it adds something to it and, indoing so, also divides the existing order. Although Mouffe (1993) recognizes theimportance of order for the everyday democratic conduct of our lives, she stressesthat any political order can only exist because of a division between ‘inside’ and‘outside’. This division is itself the most fundamental political ‘moment’. Thoseplaced outside the political community, Mouffe (2005) argues, are not excludedbecause they lack rationality or morality but because their political values are differ-ent from those held by insiders. The fact that some are included and others areexcluded is thus political in nature. It is the effect of power, of the particular hege-monic construction of inside and outside. However Mouffe (2005, 120) does notadvocate ‘pluralism without any frontiers’, considering all demands in a given soci-ety legitimate. The boundaries of the democratic community, she argues, are basedon a conflictual ‘consensus about the ethico-political values of liberty and equalityfor all’ (Mouffe 2005, 120), i.e. a consensus about those values and the possibilityof dissent about the interpretation of them. Mouffe thus separates those who plainlyreject these values and those who recognize them but are willing to struggle aboutthe interpretation. Rancière is more radical, in claiming that the essence of demo-cratic politics is the participation of those on the outside, who even hold values thatare not recognizable for those on the inside (Panagia 2009). Or as he puts it: ‘Itmakes visible what had no business being seen, and makes heard a discourse whereonce there was only a place for noise’ (Rancière 2003, 30 in Biesta 2011b, 2). Byengaging in this act of impropriety, they become political subjects and disrupt ‘theframing forces that sustain continuity within a system’. Both Mouffe and Rancièrethus reject a consensual understanding of democratic politics. For Rancière, politicsis ‘dissensus’. Mouffe (2005) criticizes a rationalist approach that denies the ineradi-cable character of antagonism and the existence of conflicts for which a rationalsolution can never be found. Democratic politics always requires making choicesbetween conflicting alternatives. It is matter of passion and commitment, arisingfrom people’s dreams and desires. Its aim is to transform antagonism into agonism.Antagonism is a struggle between enemies who do not have any common basiswhereas agonism is a struggle between conflicting parties who acknowledge thelegitimacy of their adversaries even though they realize that there is no rationalsolution for the conflict at stake. Transforming antagonism into agonism requires acommon symbolic space where conflict can emerge.

The theories put forward by Mouffe and Rancière have inspired Biesta, Toddand Säfström to develop ideas about citizenship education corresponding to whatwe have referred to as a ‘citizenship-as-practice’ perspective, which challenges theassumption of a linear, instrumental relationship between learning, citizenship anddemocracy (Table 1). Citizenship education is then a civic learning that is intrinsi-

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cally related to the experiment of democracy in a non-linear way, that is: ‘it doesnot lead [. . .] from a state of not being a citizen to being a citizen, but fluctuateswith people’s actual experiences of citizenship and with their engagement in demo-cratic experiments’ (Biesta 2011b, 6). This creates a space for a ‘subjectificationconception’ of civic learning (Biesta 2011a) that is opposed to the dominant sociali-zation conception in many respects. Civic learning as subjectification is not aimedat the acquisition of particular knowledge, skills, competences or dispositions buthas to do with an exposure to and engagement with practices where ‘public solu-tions are sought, negotiated and agreed for private troubles’ (Bauman 2000, 39 inBiesta 2011b, 6). Those solutions cannot be determined in advance but require,again and again, an experimental engagement. Past experiences of engagement con-tinue to play a role in future experiences and actions, and in this sense, it is also acumulative process. Learning, then, stems from a ‘desire for democracy’, from thewill to engage in debates and actions that may enhance the quality of our society.From this point of view, learning for participation is not the first aim in democraticprocesses. Nevertheless, individuals will most probably learn from democratic par-ticipation. It is this very engagement that is ‘subjectifying’: it is a process in andthrough which subjectivity is established and new ways of doing and being comeinto existence.

Säfström (2011) develops an analogous argument by distinguishing between‘schooling’ and ‘education’. Schooling, he argues, is based on the assumption thatteaching and learning reveal the inner truth of society, in which one is supposed tooccupy a predetermined place corresponding to that truth. Through schooling, theindividual is introduced into a certain regularity and social order. Education, in con-trast, enables us to emancipate ourselves, that is, it offers us the possibility of dis-identification from the existing order. This freedom, Säfström emphasizes, is nottotal freedom but one that is always bound to un-freedom and always negotiated inambiguous contexts where a plurality of views is articulated. This requires a spacefor conflict as an integral part of learning. Todd and Säfström (2008) argue that‘education needs to be infused with a new ethical and political language for takingconflict seriously’. This involves turning antagonism into agonism and providing aspace for learners to express a plurality of views and, at the same time, to connectthese views to larger political articulations. However, as the authors emphasize, thisis not an ‘everything goes’ approach.

This does not mean accepting, acquiescing to, agreeing with, or merely tolerating dif-ferent views; this would be absurd. However, it does require a sustained openness tolisten to other perspectives and to counter and respond. It requires treating each other

Table 1. Citizenship-as-achievement and citizenship-as-practice.

Citizenship-as-achievement Citizenship-as-practice

Socialization SubjectificationIdentification DisidentificationReproduction of existing order Interruption of existing orderConsensus oriented Conflict orientedAntagonism AgonismInequality EqualityLinear process Cumulative processSchooling Education

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as legitimate adversaries who are engaged in debate and struggle over meaning withina set of contesting norms and competing perspectives. (Todd 2010, 226)

What is needed, then, is an openness to what is new, foreign and totally different(Todd 2001).

Learning from sustainable development

Also in environmental education and in the ESD literature, the notion of ‘schooling’is increasingly challenged (Wals 2010). Researchers point at the widely acceptedobservation that we do not and cannot know what the most sustainable way of liv-ing is. They emphasize the importance of a pluralistic approach that aims atacknowledging, stimulating and engaging divergent perspectives, views and values(e.g. Öhman 2006; Jickling and Wals 2007; Rudsberg and Öhman 2010; Sandelland Öhman 2010; Wals 2010). Yet, as was mentioned at the beginning of this arti-cle, a plea for pluralism presents a paradox. A search for pluralism does not self-evidently enhance sustainability. If all learning outcomes are considered equallyvalid as long as they have emerged from a pluralistic process, this might even leadto an ‘anything goes’ relativism (Wals 2010). This is problematic since it preventslegitimate criticism of erroneous views and opinions. As Læssøe (2007, 2010)emphasizes, many of the practices of citizen participation and ESD do not evenexperiment with this tension between pluralism and relativism as they are orientedtowards teaching a consensus. Conflicts relating to the values implied in sustainabledevelopment are marginalized. This exclusion of dissent and space for collectivedebate not only neglects the far-reaching impact of sustainability issues but alsoprevents the learners’ knowledge, values and perceptions from being reflected onand challenged. In the remainder of this article, we show how a ‘citizenship-as-practice’ perspective considers this tension between pluralism and relativism at thecore of educational practices and thus offers new insights for ESD, both on a theo-retical and a practical level.

As both Rancière and Mouffe argue, democracy always involves contrastingoptions, dilemmas or conflicts. This demands public channels through which collec-tive passions can express themselves on issues. In the context of sustainability,transparent and uncontested facts are rare: experts lack insight into the complexweb of causes and effects and it is not clear who (or which groups) will suffer fromthe consequences (Dijstelbloem 2007). Nevertheless, those consequences are utmostfar-reaching and cause social controversies. Researchers as Marres (2005), Dijstel-bloem (2007) and Simons and Masschelein (2009) indicate that because these issuescannot be dealt with by existing institutions nor by the available expertise, they candevelop as ‘public issues’. The concept of ‘public’ is in line here with Dewey(1954, 15–6), who defined it as ‘all those who are affected by the indirect conse-quences of transactions, to such an extent that it is deemed necessary to have thoseconsequences systematically cared for’. For Latour (2005), such issues are ‘mattersof concern’ rather than ‘matters of fact’. The people raising concerns about theseissues are transformed into a ‘public of equals’ (Marres 2005; Simons and Massche-lein 2009). A lack of particular competences can no longer serve as a ground forexcluding individuals and groups from being involved, from being acknowledgedas a legitimate part of the public. Such issues therefore demand educational pro-cesses where citizens engage with, respond to and act in confrontation with the

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issues at stake. Starting from this perspective of ‘citizenship-as-practice’ learningfrom sustainable development is gaining significance in comparison with learningfor sustainable development.

Learning from sustainable development shifts the focus from the competencesthat citizens must acquire to the democratic nature of educational spaces and prac-tices. Issues of sustainability are invariably situated in a field of tension between‘trajectories of issue formation’ aimed at either ‘public-ization’ or at ‘privatization’(Marres 2005). Privatization prevents the involvement of ‘outsiders’ and makesthese issues inaccessible. Such threats to public-ization can stem from ‘the logic ofthe market’, from ‘the private domain’ (Biesta 2011b) or from scientific claims thatignore the debatable nature of expertise. In contrast, a sustained effort to public-izesustainability issues acknowledges the democratic paradox described above. Thisalternative approach to ESD focuses on how people may learn, again and again, inresponse to the ambiguities and differences they encounter when facing contempo-rary sustainability issues. This is not a process of schooling but an educational prac-tice, acknowledging the plurality of voices and the controversy surrounding manysustainability issues without resorting to an ‘anything goes’ relativism. Both Mouffeand Rancière’s understanding of democracy as a disruption of the existing order caninform educational processes to address, explore and articulate tensions between, onthe one hand, a plurality of views, values and knowledge claims concerning theissues at stake and, on the other hand, the sense of urgency brought about by theirfar-reaching effects. Learning from sustainable development is then a process inwhich people are willing to be surprised by others’ points of view and to face theambivalences that result from this.

ESD has at least in three different ways an important role to play in making sus-tainability issues public. Firstly, public-ization is related to whether – and how – a‘public of equals’ organizes itself, i.e. to which actors and points of view are con-sidered legitimate and which are not. Educational practices aiming at public-izationcontinuously strive for opening up issues for public involvement and prevent theexclusion of individuals, groups, opinions and arguments. This implies continuouslybalancing between diverse voices. It requires a sustained attentiveness in order toprevent that actors either claim the issue at stake or shirk responsibility by rejectinginvolvement. Secondly, public-ization has to do with the extent to which practicesof interaction provide space for divergent opinions, values and points-of-view. Anopenness to listen to other perspectives and to counter and respond is not somethingthat one can learn through instruction, yet it is possible to be attentive to thosemoments in which such an openness emerges, to the moments where learners‘respond to another’s passionate position with generosity and welcome – evenwhen, and perhaps especially when, they disagree with this very position’ (Toddand Säfström 2008). This implies that conflicts are articulated rather than resolvedor avoided and that they are dealt with in political terms (power, hegemony, con-flict) instead of in moral (good vs. bad) or rational (right vs. wrong) terms. Thirdly,public-ization is affected by the extent to which sustainability issues are claimedthrough specific expertise incorporated in educational tools and instruments or inthe discourses on the issue at stake. Such claims in the form of, for instance, stan-dardized procedures, exhibition displays presenting expertise-based information,blank exercises or concepts such as the ecological footprint diminish the opportuni-ties for the learners to voice their own stories, opinions and values and preventthem from contributing to the learning process from their own perspective. Instead

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of universally applicable, sustainability claims are always contextual and subject tosocial and political struggle. Public-izing sustainability issues is a matter of repre-senting them as a continuous quest rather than as indisputable targets that can beanticipated, planned and regulated according to predetermined guidelines. Learningprocesses, then, are not aimed at predetermined outcome, for instance in the formof knowledge, skills or behaviour but rather understood as ‘posing difficultquestions’ (Biesta 2006) with regard to the issue at stake (Table 2).

Conclusion

This article aims to contribute to an important debate in the field of environmentaleducation and ESD, i.e. the discussion about the tension between a normative and apluralistic approach (Rudsberg and Öhman 2010). We have tried to fertilize thisdebate by presenting an alternative view on the relation between education, citizen-ship and democracy and by proposing a democratic perspective that emphasizesconcrete issues and the importance of creating spaces and practices in which a pub-lic of equals can emerge. The scope of this paper is limited to the articulation of analternative theoretical way of looking at environmental education and ESD. Wewanted to emphasize the importance of analysing the democratic character of educa-tional practices instead of merely focusing on the acquisition of individual compe-tences. With the elaborated theoretical perspective, we aim to inspire environmentaleducation and ESD researchers to further empirically explore the issue of democ-racy in educational processes that address sustainability issues. It can stimulateresearchers to understand how the use of particular educational tools, the kind ofinteraction and the diversity of voices stimulate ‘public-izing’ as well as ‘privatiz-ing’ tendencies within practices of ESD.

AcknowledgementThe authors thank the three anonymous reviewers of this paper for their very helpfulsuggestions.

Notes1. The notion ‘ESD’ is highly contested in academic literature. Different authors use more

than 20 distinct terms to point to learning processes in the field of sustainability issues:‘education for sustainable development’, ‘education about sustainable development’,‘education as sustainability’, ‘learning as sustainability’, ‘education for sustainability’,‘learning for sustainability’, ‘sustainable education’, ‘sustainable learning’, ‘environmentand development education’, ‘education for environment and sustainable development’,

Table 2. Learning for sustainable development and learning from sustainable development.

Learning for sustainable development Learning from sustainable development

Indisputable matters-of-fact Puzzling matters-of-concernDriven by clear knowledge Driven by concern and commitmentMoral/rational language Ethical and political languageConflict resolution/aversion Conflict articulationIndisputable targets Continuous questUniversal sustainability claims Contextual sustainability claimsPredetermined answers Difficult questions

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‘education for environment and development’, ‘environmental education for sustainabledevelopment’, ‘education for sustainable futures’, ‘education for a sustainable future’,‘environmental education for equitable and sustainable societies’, ‘environmental educa-tion for sustainable societies and global responsibility’, ‘environmental education for thedevelopment of responsible societies’, ‘education for a better world’, ‘education forsustainable contraction’, ‘education consistent with Agenda 21’, ‘education 21’, ‘ecoped-agogy’, etc. Each (slight) distinction refers to differences in opinion and/or interpreta-tion. It is beyond the scope of this article to consider this discussion extensively.Instead, we pragmatically use the term ESD since we address the increasing influence ofsustainable development on environmental education as a policy-driven tendency andESD is the word used in policy discourse. In our conclusion, yet, we put forward theidea of ‘learning from sustainable development’ as an alternative perspective that takesinto account several concerns that play a part in this debate.

2. For example, Environmental Education Research, Journal of Environmental Education,Southern African Journal of Environmental Education, Ethics and Action, InternationalResearch in Geographical & Environmental Education, Canadian Journal of Environ-mental Education, The journal of the Australian Association for Environmental Educa-tion, Journal of Sustainability in Higher Education and Applied EnvironmentalEducation and Communication.

Notes on contributorsKatrien Van Poeck is a PhD student at the Laboratory for Education and Society (LES),Catholic University of Leuven (Belgium). She analyzes how EE practices deal with thechallenges posed by the UN Decade for ESD.

Joke Vandenabeele is a senior lecturer at the Laboratory for Education and Society (LES) atthe Catholic University of Leuven (Belgium). The key topics of her research are: citizenshipeducation, social and biographical learning, and democratic practices.

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